Shopping carts with internal baskets are used widely in supermarkets, department stores and in open markets. Shopping carts generally comprise front wheels attached to a base via a caster assembly positioned on a pivoting shaft so the customer may turn the cart by applying a gentle forward force on the handgrip. The rear wheels usually roll solely forward on an axle parallel to that of the front shaft.
Stepping stools are commonly found within supermarkets, but are rarely found inside, or connected to, the shopping carts that are readily available to customers. Therefore, customers who can't easily reach the “top shelf” must usually call for assistance.
Items on the “top shelf” of common supermarkets are surprisingly not totally out of reach, and usually require a stepping stool raised only to 6-10″. Stepping stools are customarily small and low enough to the ground to be fully utilized used in a single step (usually making multi-step stools unnecessary).
While folding step ladders are taller, they are generally to bulky to effectively fit inside a shopping cart, and also too large to lay flat against the shopping cart's base (base-rack). Step ladders are also too bulky to effectively “clamp and conceal” within a shopping cart.
Some supermarkets offer folding hand trucks featuring dolly configurations, optionally offering a dolly coupled to the cart's front frame. Unfortunately, these hand trucks can be used only to transport large items, and they do not help the typical customer who simply needs an “easy pull-out step stool” to reach top-shelf items.
The present invention allows the customer to “fold out” the step stool from its “stored-position” (collapsed, folded and resting flush with the back of the shopping cart OR fully collapsed and resting atop/along the cart's base rack), then fold out the “kick-up legs” with arched connecting bar. The “kick up legs” feature rubber-type stoppers for braking-and-anchoring against the store floor, then [after using the stool to reach their desired item] lifting the “kick-up legs” with their uniquely-arched connecting bar; then the customer may alternatively “rotate-up” the stool back to its stored position by rotating/turning the stool around the cart's rear-side base bar using the stool's uniquely-designed “foam-teeth C clamp,” as a hinge, or the customer may alternatively un-clamp the stool from the cart with a relatively gentle pull, then fold-up the kick-up legs, then lay the entire stool [now flat like a folding table in its fully-collapsed-state] flat against the cart's base bottom rack.
The stepping stool's utility is enhanced by its portability between the base of the shopping cart, the floor, and [by easily unclamping] use anywhere else the customer wishes to use it (even at home). The stool therefore goes wherever the shopping cart goes, and the customer can unfold-&-rotate it out again for future use.